For the one person that couldn't as...
Anonymous on
NYC – Kamil Needs Some Help
Nik Silver Efex Pro 3.0 Follow-up
Seems that my mini-review of Nik Silver Efex for Aperture sparked a mild amount of interest from a couple of people that haven’t done a whole lot of black and white conversions to date, are interested in the Silver Efex plug-in and wanted a little bit more info.Of course they pointed out the flaws in my quick and dirty review of the software. One guy even asked if I ever shoot any thing that I have to walk more than 10 feet from my desk to shoot. He was kidding (I hope).
The consensus question was if it was worth the cash. I really hate to make those kind of value judgements for other people, the variables are so different for everyone. I will weigh in on the “worth it” just a little bit for Silver Efex Pro only because it is a non-trivial investment and it has some pretty narrow functionality compared to say a Photoshop CS4 or Lightroom or Aperture 2. My opinion is that it is worth it if you use it. Use meaning a lot of things. I will rephrase a couple of things from my original review to be clear. If you like black and white photography but the software you are using it not cutting it then Silver Efex is probably worth the money. If you do a heck of a lot of black and white and Silver Efex could save you a lot of time then it is worth the money. I did say that it was the best black and white conversion software that I have ever used. I bought it and I was quite satisfied with using all of the bag of tricks in Photoshop that I have developed over the years. Then again I am a nut.
I guess you should try it – Nik does have a free trial version. See what you think. If you like black and white but rather shoot digital and not mess around with film and a darkroom you should definitely do the free trial. Like all of the Nik software this has some depth and deserves some dedicated time behind the wheel rather than a couple of clicks here and there so start the eval when you will have time to do it justice.
The bigger flaw that a few people pointed out was that they had a hard time visualizing what I
started with for the image that I included with the review. I apologize for that, looking back on it I was stupid not to include the starting color digital image so here it is. Not only that but you can have the whole RAW NEF file as well so you can examine the color, black and white versions that Aperture does as well as what Nik can do in all of the glorious 100% detail if you want. You can even take a look at the strange 12-24 lens distortion if you want and see how the brand spanking new Nikon Capture NX2 automatically knows how to correct it based on a database of Nikon lenses included with it. You gotta love NX2 sometimes. Obviously I didn’t use NX2 for this conversion.
I even went way out of my way, walked out my front door, across a dirt road, and through some grass to make this image for all of you today. I guess that was about 150 feet. Have fun.
RB
Ps. What would really be fun is to see some reader black and white interpretations of the same image. I will bet dollars to doughnuts that they will be different than mine.
Answer to smart-alec #1,
If this were a fine art image I would crop it to 5×7 aspect ratio, add a vignette. Print a digital negative of exactly the right tone curve (yes I can do that) and contact print it on “silver gelatin” paper.
I would use some fancy language to imply that it was shot on a 5×7 view camera with a really expensive 65mm german lens and enlarged but not really claim that it was.
The title would be Jacob’s nose number 7. It was in the middle of like 14 or 15 images I shot today and the place where the grass is growing is called Jacob’s nose but I would not explain that.
RB
Oh and I would probably spend like 15 minutes on it instead of 15 seconds and do some local adjustments.
I like Silver Efex because I can stay within the Aperture workflow.
I don’t have PS simply because I’m not forking over $600+ for software that I will rarely use with a steep learning curve.
I’ve been very pleased with Silver Efex. The presets are useful for getting close to the final image and any of the presets can then be further adjusted and/or a control point used for local adjustment. Furthermore, presets can be exported and shared so that we can all have a “RB landscape preset” even if there are no Ansel Adams Lightroom presets (we still have not decided if there should be).
Is it worth it? It is for me, simply because it quickly gives high-quality results without a steep learning curve all without leaving the Aperture workflow. The interface is polished and straightforward.
PS: The above image can never be a fine art image. There are no naked people, broken things, or broken naked people things. If you towed a broken tractor up there or a S**thouse with the door falling off, it would then be worthy of consideration. Or better yet, simply exhibit a black image, say that it represents your anguish taken with your Leica and sell prints (small ones). I can say this because I KNOW art.
Jason,
I was fresh out of tractors yesterday – I am expecting a new batch soon. As for naked people I got too many nasty grams from my last naked people post to post naked people images for a while but you are right I really should have chucked a naked person in the foreground or maybe the water for this image.
RB
For fine art, they don’t have to be VISIBLY naked, just UNDERSTOOD to be naked (without saying so). Also, use a broken mannequin in lieu of real broken naked people . If you don’t have a whole mannequin, just stick a leg or arm in the dirt or out in the water making sure that it perfectly follows the rule of thirds. The s**thouse and/or the tractor still has to be real though (and broken).
Also, don’t listen to the critics. They don’t know fine art and they don’t buy anything off of your links.
RB
As far as I can see you are not Forceing anyone to view the site, so I am always perplexed by folks who visit a free site, and feel compelled (and justified) to offer criticism of what is appropriate content for you to put on your site.
Even harder to explain, is that if the basis for criticsm is the relative lack of clothing of persons depicted in the small image at the top of the post, why choose your site to complain about? I am told, that there are more than a few sites on the web that are Totally dedicated to people without any clothes at all. If this is true, then your critics are missing a huge opportunity elsewhere.
You should find out if this is really true , and if such sites do exist, you should provide a link as a service to these readers so their criticism can have maximum effect.
To be totally fair, you might have to do some research, and include some objective metrics— such as Square centimeters of skin vs square Cms of total screen area as
measured on a 23″ cinema display.
By compiling a database of “Skin ratios” you would then be able to post it at the bottom of each page as a helpful guideline for weather or not viewers should be offended.
(some calculus may be necessary in the calculation of the area of various non-rectilinear shapes, but since these shapes often recur algorithms could be developed)
Over time, enough data could be collected so that you could provide SEER (skin exposure efficiency rating) on each page.
Just like air conditioners at Sears This Page has a SEER of xx Other pages have SEERs from xx to xxx.
By providing this service you will greatly aid these concerned readers by helping them to realize that their efforts are really needed…elsewhere.